Elaine Hendrix and Lisa Ann Walter’s Parent Trap characters may not have been on the same page, but the pair’s real-life friendship has stood the test of time.
Hendrix and Walter connected while filming 1998’s The Parent Trap. Walter played Chessy, nanny to Hallie (Lindsay Lohan), while Hendrix portrayed Meredith, the girlfriend of Haillie’s father (Dennis Quaid). While their characters were at odds in the beloved film, their off-screen dynamic blossomed into a beautiful and long-lasting friendship.
“I feel like that happens sometimes on projects, like you just find someone that you really like, and you get along with them. And that’s who you want to hang with. She was that for me during the project,” Walter said of her and Hendrix’s friendship in a September 2023 interview with Entertainment Weekly. “But then when you know that it’s more, is when you keep hanging out after the project ends, and that’s what we did.”
Since The Parent Trap, Hendrix and Walter have remained close. The pair have supported each other at various public events, including award shows and charity galas. When Hendrix joined the cast of Dancing With the Stars in season 34, Walter was in the audience to support her pal during the live shows.
Keep scrolling for Hendrix and Walter’s complete friendship timeline:
1998
While Walter and Hendrix saw each other in passing during the audition process, they didn’t officially meet until the first day of filming. The Abbott Elementary star recalled how she asked Hendrix if she wanted to join her for lunch.
“One of us, probably me, asked if she wanted to go to Marie Callender’s, because I wanted to eat pie. I was in Chessy-core clothing — what the kids now call Chessy-core. So Elaine had a salad. I ate a pie,” Walter told EW in September 2023. “But we did not leave the table for … it had to have been four hours. And then [she] came back to the room. And we talked for another couple of hours. It was like a long first friendship date, where we got all the info.”
June 2008
The twosome performed together on stage for the What a Pair event in Los Angeles.
June 2011
Hendrix supported Walter at the signing for her book The Best Thing About My Ass Is That It’s Behind Me.
October 2022
The pair enjoyed a night out at the Last Chance For Animals 2022 Compassion Gala.
February 2023
Walter brought Hendrix as her plus one to the SAG Awards, where the Abbott Elementary cast won the award for Outstanding Ensemble in a Comedy Series.
September 2023
Hendrix and Walter participated in Ancestry’s web series unFamiliar, in which they discovered that their great-grandparents lived a few blocks away from each other in New York City.
“It’s almost not a surprise,” Walter reflected. “Why in the world would we have met and become besties in six hours?”
Hendrix agreed that their friendship “was fate.”
July 2025
Walter supported Hendrix at the premiere of her film Freakier Friday. The women also had a sweet reunion with Lohan.
September 2025
The duo enjoyed a night out at the Emmys.
October 2025
Before Dedication Night on DWTS, Hendrix teased that Walter was going to have a special role in her performance.
“A big thing is my best friend Lisa Ann Walter is going to be joining us,” Hendrix told Us Weekly during an exclusive interview ahead of the episode. “And when they said that we’re doing a Dedication Week, she was the only person I thought of. She had to do it.”
Hendrix added that not only is Walter a special person in her life, but the dance will also pay tribute to The Parent Trap.
“Part of [the fun] is the fans of Parent Trap and the fans who have grown up with us and who have been with us for over 30 years, sharing our friendship,” Hendrix explained. “So much of it is for them and what our love represents for them. I just feel like the world right now just needs some love, needs some tears, needs some joy and that’s what we are going to bring.”
November 2025
As Hendrix competed in the November 25 finale, Walter cheered on her bestie from the front row. She also appeared in Hendrix and pro partner Alan Bersten’s freestyle, playing a casting director in the A Chorus Line-inspired routine that earned a perfect score.
